-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- The Elven Sorceress -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- BALDUR'S GATE: DARK ALLIANCE - SORCERESS GUIDE SONY PLAYSTATION 2 WRITTEN BY: kErosion VERSION 0.1 12/31/01 COPYRIGHT 2001 BY kErosion -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Introduction -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- This guide is dedicated to the absolute hottest thong-clad spell slinging elven vixen to ever grace the pixels of a videogame. Not only does she capture the satisfaction of bringing endless hordes of monsters to a messy end through blasts of lightning, searing flames, and bone numbing cold, but she's more than willing to get in up close and personal from time to time. All this in a skirt and without breaking a nail. It's about time a video game captured all the fire and tenacity that my girlfriends have long possessed. You've got to applaud Snow Blind studios for unleashing this devilish thing on us all. I feel guide is extremely spoiler-intensive. Half of the fun of Baldurs Gate is through the exploring the skills. I would not wish to rob that from anyone playing BG:DA for the first time. Instead this guide is meant for players who have had their hands on the game a while and are interested in seeing what other options available from skills they might not have chosen their first time through. Whether you choose to continue or not is at your discretion, but I strongly advise against spoiling your first trip through the game. So without using any further space on pleasantries, I bring you my Sorceress Guide. :) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- The Sorceress -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Passive Feats: ------------------------------------------------------- | Feat | Points Needed Per Level | ------------------------------------------------------- Accuracy : ( 1) Targeting : ( 1) Willpower : ( 1) ( 2) ( 3) ( 4) ( 5) Meditation : ( 1) ( 2) ( 3) ( 4) ( 5) Intestinal Fort : ( 1) ( 2) ( 3) ( 4) ( 5) ------------------------------------------------------- Accuracy: Cheap and useful if you want to make use of a bow. Targeting: Cheap, I've found that you really don't need the targeting line to shoot though. Just follow where the arrows go. Meditation: Most useful early in the game. Even with 5 points you will find that eventually you still use way more energy than it regenerates. Potion popping will always be the main source of rejeuvination. Intestinal Fortitude: Same story as Meditation. Useful, but after a while you won't even notice it. Willpower: It doesn't hurt but I would find a good spell before investing any here. Now that the 'less interesting' feats are over with... A quick note on terms found through the rest of this. X = Skill already available at creation. Level = The level of the skill obtained. Or how many of the dots filled. Points Spent = How many points must be spent to obtain each level of a skill. Energy Cost = The amount of energy spent for every casting of the spell. Damage = If you need clarification don't read any further, you'll save yourself a headache. :) Some of the tables only have the energy cost or damage filled in only for the first level of the spell and --- in the spaces from then on. This represents a spell which the energy cost or damage does not increase from further levels obtained in the spell. (not that I ran out of ink for those of you wondering) (Drum Roll please...) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- The Spells -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Magic Missile: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st --- --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 1 --- --- --- --- Energy Cost : 4 --- --- --- --- Damage : 3-6 --- --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- As the saying goes, you get what you pay for. Magic Missile may see some use early on in Easy and Normal difficulties, but even with the extra missiles you can obtain as you level up this spell is quickly overshadowed by stronger options. A good bow is almost always the better option. Burning Hands: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : X 2 3 4 5 Energy Cost : 6/s 9/s 12/s 15/s 18/s Damage : 12/s 15/s 18/s 21/s 24/s ------------------------------------------------------- Burning Hands is the first spell a Sorceress will obtain, considering she starts with it. Not surprisingly it's also THE worst spell available, Magic Missile being the only possible contender for the title. The only thing worse than the damage output of Burning Hands is the amount of energy that needs to be provided per second of use. Snowblind: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 10 11 13 15 19 Energy Cost : 15/s 18/s 21/s 24/s 27/s Damage : 18/s 21/s 24/s 27/s 30/s ------------------------------------------------------- Snowblind is basicly a slightly upgraded version of Burning Hands. Like Burning Hands it causes damage per second to anything standing in the area of effect, while sucking a TON of energy every second along with it. The damage isn't very impressive, energy consumption horrendous. The slight damage boost of Snowblind over Burning Hands really isn't worth it, neither are wise choices for Extreme. The Damage-Energy ratio is probably the absolute worst in the game. Melf's Acid Arrow: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 4 8 12 16 20 Energy Cost : 5 --- --- --- --- Damage : 8-18 13-23 18-28 23-33 28-38 ------------------------------------------------------- Melf's Acid Arrow is the acid version of projectile type spells. The spell isn't very strong, but as far as I know there isn't a single enemy in the game immune to this spell, and if there is they're enemies that die quickly to stronger spells. The low end damage is also higher than any of the other spells of this type making Melf's Acid Arrow a great spell to fall-back on when all else fails. Fireball: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 8 9 11 13 17 Energy Cost : 10 --- --- --- --- Damage : 10-25 10-30 10-35 10-40 10-45 ------------------------------------------------------- A magnificently average spell. The fire version of the projectile line of spells is also very inconsistent. Fireball causes things to be knocked back slightly with every hit, which can be used to force Eldritch into a position where throwing her sword will hit an object, but because the low end damage never increases you may want to skip this one altogether, or only take 1 point at the most. Otiluke's Icy Sphere: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 14 15 17 19 23 Energy Cost : 12 --- --- --- --- Damage : 1-20 1-25 1-30 1-35 1-40 ------------------------------------------------------- Even more inconsistent (and weaker) than Fireball, the Ice Sphere has one thing going for it. It chills monsters slowing them down for a second or two when it hits which can come in useful from time to time. It may be a better option to sling a stronger spell and just kill with that extra second slowing down a target will buy, but that's just my thought on the matter. Now may be a good time to point out that Otiluke's Icy Sphere does NOT effect many of the bosses, especially late in the game where the chilling effect would be of most use. Lightning Bolt: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 12 13 --- --- --- Energy Cost : 24 --- --- --- --- Damage : 72 72 --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- I just want to say I love the graphics on this spell. :) If it weren't for stronger options around the same time you can afford this spell I'd love to make use of Lightning Bolt some time. Lightning Bolt is like a high powered, more mana efficient Burning Hands or Snowblind but with a long, LONG range. The first point in Lightning Bolt is only single target, the second point placed in the spell causes the lightning blasts to hop from critter to critter doing very intense damage for the amount of points placed in it. Also note that this spell is continuous, doing damage every second the button is held down. Lightning Bolts look amazing late at night with all the lights turned off. :) Fire Shield: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 18 19 21 23 27 Energy Cost : 20 --- --- --- --- Damage : 18 --- --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- Fire Shield is another of my favorite spells. Each point added to it increases the time the flames created by the spell to last another second, up to a maximum of 5 seconds. Unfortunately the damage doesn't scale up with it and the area of effect isn't very big, Fire Shield is more of a luxury right now as due to the low damage instead of being an incredibly useful spell. Fire Shield does its damage very fast causing everything to walk over one to get stunned over and over again very quick, and I mean everything. The flames of this spell are probably the safest way to kill particularly fast, hard hitting creatures on Extreme, including some bosses, it just takes a while. The only things that seem to be partially immune to the stun effect from Fire Shield are some of the metal knights at the very end of the game. Meteor Swarm: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st --- --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 22 --- --- --- --- Energy Cost : 40 --- --- --- --- Damage : 1-40 --- --- --- --- ------------------------------------------------------- Large area of effect, cheap to train, and incredibly deadly. If not for a couple draw backs Meteor Swarm would be the best spell in the Elves potent arsenal. If Meteor Swarm were capable of being chain-cast this would be the absolute fastest way to kill in the game, unfortunately every time the spell is used there is a particularly long 'recovery' time in which no spells may be cast. Even in extreme many monsters will die in 2 or 3 hits of the spell, unfortunately for the Sorceress she is usually being beat on before she can cast the second. The other draw back is that to make best use of this spell you need to get VERY close for most of the meteors to hit, this can be a very bad idea for some bosses. ESPECIALLY on Extreme where this spell would be a very useful thing. With any luck future sequels of BG:DA will have multiple levels of Meteor Swarm, starting with lower damage and ending with around the same power or slightly higher. With half the recovery time. Ball Lightning: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 16 17 19 21 25 Energy Cost : 15 --- --- --- --- Damage : 36 72 108 144 180 ------------------------------------------------------- When it absolutely positively MUST be destroyed NOW, Ball Lightning is probably the most suited choice for the job. 180 damage per second is a very scary thing. What makes it even scarier is that the 180 damage per second is done to EVERYTHING near the ball of lightning. That Ball Lightning has a very short recast time, only needs a VERY low amount of energy, and will travel until it hits a solid object like a wall makes Ball Lightning something to truly be feared. It's not uncommon that I send 2 or 3 of these flying down a hall on Extreme then finding the hallway littered with the bodies of dead critters. Ball Lightning is so strong maxed out it's probably unbalanced for the lower difficulties, one blast is all you need for almost everything but bosses unless playing Extreme. The only draw back is that there are a few enemies scattered throughout the game that are immune to lightning. Unfortunately this includes the last boss of the game so you'll need a back-up spell for these things if you plan on going with Ball Lightning. Mordenkainen's Sword: ------------------------------------------------------- Level : 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th ------------------------------------------------------- Points Spent : 12 18 24 32 40 Energy Cost : 20 25 30 35 40 Damage : 1-20 1-40 1-60 1-80 1-100 ------------------------------------------------------- I just recently discovered this spell and I like it. I like it a lot. For just a little mana you get your very own portable mini-warrior to follow you around for a while doing damage. Well, mini-warrior is an over-statement as it can't tank for you and the damage is inconsistent, but it's impressive to say the least. I really prefer this spell over the arrow line of spells to deal with things immune to my lightning. But then again this spell could be used at the same time as an arrow spell. I have a couple complaints with this spell though. First the cost is through the roof at the higher points, especially with the low end damage only being 1 for every level. This is just rediculous. It looks like this spell was very cheap, and did something like 60-100 during balance testing and they did a double-nerf reducing damage and upping cost effectively breaking the usefulness and never made it truly useful again. If you have some spare points at higher levels, this is a great place to put them. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright: Please note this Document is (c) Copyright 2001 by author, David S. Graham, and nothing herein may be reproduced in any way, shape, or form without authors consent. If you want to use this Document for any reason, make sure to get in touch and ask. I can be reached at kErosion@west.net